


The Laws of Motion

by thimble



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist (Anime 2003)
Genre: F/M, Post-Series Pre-Movie
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-23
Updated: 2018-07-23
Packaged: 2019-06-15 03:48:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,266
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15404286
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thimble/pseuds/thimble
Summary: Grief, as it turns out, is not just an ocean, faceless and vast. It can be a partner, too, capable of leaving a dent in the mattress, or a scent in the air. It's grief that bows deeply before her, asking her to dance 'til morning, and grief that reaches out to tuck a strand of her hair behind her ear and whispers truths along the curve of it.Grief says,you’re not made of stone; you can't stand still forever.She says,watch me.After Ed disappears, Winry tries her best to heal.





	The Laws of Motion

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the [FMA Anthology](https://fmaanthology.tumblr.com/), and as a love letter to Conqueror of Shamballa.

**_inertia_ **

 

It's times like these that she wishes she had a supply of sweets, stashed in close reach whenever one of her younger patients came by. Today's tune-up is done and over with, but the boy's pitiful sniffling isn’t. She's not without a nurturing touch, but a lollipop or two would really come in handy right about now.

Come to think of it, her parents used to have one of those. It seems problem solving with sugar ran in the Rockwell gene.

"There you go. Try to be careful while you're getting used to the new weight, alright?"

The boy has no shortage of waterworks, still — baleful eyes, trembling bottom lip, and all. "It hurts, miss."

Her answering smile is gentle, albeit helpless. She stands and takes his other hand, imploring him to do the same. "Come on now, your mom's outside. You don't want her to see you crying, do you?"

That gets him to straighten up, shaking his head. Pride widens her smile, and she wears it when she ushers him back to waiting arms. His eyes are dry as she talks about maintenance with his mother, and they remain dry when the two of them leave.

She turns to close the door once they're gone, her grip tightening on the doorknob upon remembering: that was her last appointment for the day. No one else is coming. It'll just be her, Granny, Den, and the thoughts that would lay beside her in bed after the candle's been blown out.

Her smile falters. It's times like these that it sinks in — the realization that her idea of a fix is temporary, and that she's going to have to actually confront all of this sooner or later.

But not today. Today, she gets a hold of herself and closes the door, and thinks about buying some candy.

 

 

 

She hadn't been certain what being a State Alchemist entailed, and of course she'd known how dangerous it was to be in the military. And it's not as if the Elrics, fueled by Ed's impulsiveness and Al's innate urge to indulge his big brother, had ever been entirely normal playmates. Ed hadn't been dubbed Fullmetal by staying out of trouble, after all.

Still, she had preferred not to think of them ever coming into harm. Not after their run-in with Barry the Chopper, and not even after they were shipped back to Resembool shattered in more ways than one.

There had always been a chance, one that her scientific brain knew but her stubborn heart refused to acknowledge, that each goodbye might be the last.

It was a possibility that had turned into reality the moment she saw Al — the real him, not the suit of armor she'd also come to recognize as his face — without Ed in tow. For a smart girl like her, it hadn't been hard to put the pieces together.

He'd looked like a child because that's what he was. He'd acted like most of the people around him were strangers because that's what they were. He'd spoken like the past four years hadn't happened, because for him, they didn't.

He's forgotten everything, they told her, everything since that day. But when she'd visited him in the hospital and pulled up a chair, his face had brightened up.

At least he hadn't forgotten her.

"Hey, Al. How are you feeling?"

"Winry!" he'd said, voice cheerful and somewhat relieved. "I'm so glad to see you. I don't know anyone here, and I was starting to feel bad telling people that."

Despite herself, and despite everything, she'd smiled, and it was genuine. "I'm really glad to see you, too."

They'd talked for a little while, though neither of them had brought up the empty bed beside Al's, right where his brother should've been.

 

 

 

Back then, she thought she knew what grief was. Grief was a letter in the mail, apologetic but impersonal, telling her that Mom and Dad had been killed in active service. Grief was the sudden tightness in her chest when Granny said it meant they were never coming home. Grief was crying an ocean's worth of tears into the crook of her arm that afternoon, then doing it again in the afternoons that followed.

That was how it happened to her, and though her world was smaller then — only a countryside, with green grass all the way to the horizon and an endless blue sky above it, nothing more and nothing less — the Elrics' version was similar, so she didn't question it. As far as she was concerned, grief had a singular face, one with worn-out eyes and salt-streaked cheeks.

At least, until she'd glanced up, one day, to a familiar shade of red in her living room, as bold and jarring as it had always been in her world of greens and blues.

Shock had pried her fingers loose from around a wrench, then suspended the breath in her lungs. In a moment that felt longer than it could've been, she'd seen someone who shouldn't have been there, and the little details that should've given it away hadn't mattered.

Al's grin had been sheepish upon realizing his mistake.

"Sorry for coming in without knocking, Winry."

The mirage had faded in an instant. That simple word in the beginning of his sentence had done the trick, allowing her to exhale as she picked the wrench up from the floor.

Ed could never have been so well-mannered.

"Don't sweat it, Al." She'd bitten her lip before adding, "Trying out a new outfit?"

He'd laughed at that, sounding self-conscious. "I asked around, and they said — ah, Brother is way too flashy, isn't he? Should I change it?"

She'd shaken her head immediately, and not just to avoid seeing his face fall. "It suits you."

She'd meant it, too. The fit around his shoulders and the contrast against his hair had been different, but that crooked smile, the curves of which she'd recognize in her sleep, was exactly the same.

 

 

 

It gets better with time.

Nobody tells her so, not outright, but she can read it in their eyes, unspoken for fear of being presumptuous, so she's the one who says it aloud if they ask.

"I'm fine," she'd say, in the tone she adopted anytime she was on the phone with Ed, in place of chiding at him to call more often. "I'm doing great, really."

She's a Rockbell — the strength's in the name. And it's not as if anybody had the guts to call her a liar, either way.

It gets better with time.

This is what she tells herself too, having experienced this all before. The notion that someone important wasn't coming back isn't new to her, and it's a lesson everyone learns sooner or later. Loss is a part of life, as is moving on.

But when she gets one, two, three offers to work in Rush Valley — that's multiple childhood dreams fulfilled — she still finds herself saying no, thank you, I think I'll stay in Resembool a little while longer.

It gets better with time.

That's just simple logic, isn't it? Wounds heal, and even scars fade. One day she might see a boy with golden blonde hair and not compare him with the image in her head, impossible to live up to, especially in embellished memory.

"You're really good at this," he says as she is in the middle of tuning up his left arm. He's tinted pink and he can't quite look at her, and she knows where this is going.

"You're one of those guys, aren't you," she teases, as if she isn't dreading it. "You think flattery will get you everywhere."

"Not everywhere. Just to dinner, maybe."

Getting the words out enables him to meet her gaze, his eyes hopeful, sincere — and green.

"You're sweet," she says, smiling kindly to make up for the soft cruelty of what's next. "But I'm not interested."

One day she might see him and not think, you're all wrong, because it's not his fault at all, but that day isn't today.

It gets better with time.

If Al's grief manifests every time he looks in a mirror, she wonders what it looks like for her, though she doesn't have to wonder long. Later, when the house has fallen asleep and it's just her and the stars again, her arms move of their own accord, so quickly she doesn't realize it at first.

She claps, once, the sound of it echoing in the quiet, and sets her palms on the windowsill.

As if alchemy can succeed where everything else has failed.

Her eyes burn when she returns to herself, a hand flying to her mouth to mute the sob she chokes on. Grief, as it turns out, is not just an ocean, faceless and vast. It can be a partner, too, capable of leaving a dent in the mattress, or a scent in the air. It's grief that bows deeply before her, asking her to dance 'til morning, and grief that reaches out to tuck a strand of her hair behind her ear and whispers truths along the curve of it.

Grief says, _you’re not made of stone; you can't stand still forever._

She says, _watch me._

 

* * *

 

  ** _Σf=ma_**

 

The way she sees it, not everyone can be a force of nature. Some people are meant to live loudly and eventfully, transforming the world by sheer virtue of existing; some people never linger in one place enough to take root.

Some people deliberately set their childhood houses on fire until it turns to ash, and others stay where they are to make sure those people have somewhere to come back to.

Not everyone can be an Elric.

From under her bed, she pulls out a suitcase, opening the lid to regard the pieces she'd been working on for the past two years. It's her pet project kept secret from even Granny, a tangible proof of hope she couldn't let anyone see, lest it came to nothing.

But news from Central travels fast, more so if it involves a certain missing alchemist. Her mind's made up the moment she takes the suitcase out of its hiding place. When she's ready to leave, she hoists the strap of it on her shoulder, feeling the weight of its contents down to the bone.

It's only right.

She might as well be wearing her heart on her sleeve; of course it would be heavier than anything she's ever carried.

 

 

 

Enclosed in her arms and tucked under her chin, Ed is warm.

She doesn't know what she expected when she saw him — dusty and haggard, yet still more vibrant than she remembers — but it makes sense that he's warm. He's here, after all, real and alive and the farthest thing from just a memory.

There's so much she wants to say.

First, there's the matter of his broken prosthetics, and later, when it's all over, she'll think it fitting that it's what their meeting entailed.

Words are difficult and unwieldy, but automail is a language both of them understand.

 

 

 

"I'm surprised, Ed," she says, in the midst of the painstaking task of connecting the nerves. "You're not crying — much."

"Hey! My body's not the only thing that's grown, you know."

"Mm-hmm, sure. Are you going to try to convince me you drink milk now, too?”            

The old Ed might have stuck out his tongue, but this Ed simply smiles, sheepish and crooked. “You caught me.”

There are other differences, like the way he wears his hair or the breadth of his shoulders, but it’s that smile that ties a knot in her stomach. A glimpse at his eyes betrays things he’s seen that she probably never will, and somehow, all the things he still means to do.

It’s a future that doesn’t include her. He doesn’t have to say it out loud.

 

 

 

Then, just like that, with the last screw tightened and the rest of the world calling for his attention, it’s time to let go.

She doesn’t hold onto his wrist, or entwine metal fingers with her own, as much as she’d like to. She watches the shape of his back as he runs headfirst into trouble like usual, her insides tied up like gift ribbons, and curses her own cowardice.

Won’t she ever ask him to stay?

For one reason or another, it’s the transmutation in the sky that unravels the knot and lets her breathe again. She looks to Sheska beside her, whose eyes are watery behind her glasses.

Her own smile wavers but doesn’t break – steadfast, like usual.

“He’s always been terrible at goodbyes.”

 

* * *

 

**_for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction_ **

 

She gets these dreams, sometimes, of holding golden-haired, golden-eyed children in her arms, one of them wearing a telltale crooked smile every time she makes him laugh. She's happy in these dreams, in a way she can't quite capture and take with her when she wakes up. In these dreams, she waves at Ed as his train pulls away, and waits for him to return.

In these dreams, he does.

She's packed a different suitcase today, filled with her belongings now. In her purse is a ticket to Rush Valley, purchased in advance. Outside, the blue sky still stretches on, but the green grass no longer seems so infinite.

These dreams can't dictate her reality anymore.

She claps, once, and sets her palms on the windowsill, right along the line of the horizon. It was never as far as she thought it was.

It's time for her to meet it.


End file.
